57. Deputy Thomas P. Broughan asked the Minister
for Transport, Tourism and Sport his plans to legislate for low-slow
speed home zones; his further plans to review speed limits in the Road Traffic
Act 2004; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29460/19]

Up to 9 a.m. this morning, 81 of our fellow citizens tragically lost
their lives on the roads so far this year. That includes 14 pedestrians, 45
drivers, ten passengers, eight motorcyclists and six pedal cyclists.

That is a tragic
figure, and it is higher than it was at this stage last year. I have asked the
Minister about home zones on housing estates and in built up areas in general
and why we are not being more proactive in that regard with slow speed zones.
Second, I have also asked how the Minister is liaising with the RSA to adopt a
stronger approach towards aggressive and fast driving, which often leads to the
tragic loss of life and to injuries.

I thank the Deputy for once again raising an important issue aimed at
saving the lives of people on our roads, and in this case aimed at saving
vulnerable people, including children in vulnerable areas.

While the Road Traffic Act 2004 sets default speed limits for various
categories of roads, elected members of local authorities have the statutory
responsibility for making special speed limit by-laws for roads in their area –
with, in the case of national roads, the consent of Transport Infrastructure
Ireland, TII. The making of such by-laws is a reserved function of elected
members.

My Department issued updated guidelines for setting and managing speed
limits in Ireland in 2015 to assist local authorities in setting special speed
limits, taking account of relevant national policy and local circumstances,
including road safety. Provision was made for greater use of lower speed limits
in urban areas. This includes greater use of the 30 km/h speed limit, as used
widely in the EU, and 30 km/h slow zones. This corresponds to 20 mph, the
lowest limit in the UK. These slow zones can be introduced to increase safety
for the most vulnerable on suitable roads, such as roads immediately adjacent
to play areas. Road authorities are asked to seriously consider lowering the
speed limit from 50 km/h to 30 km/h in residential estates. Since 2015, 30 km/h
speed limits have been applied in more than 6,400 housing estates. Where a
limit of 30 km/h is being implemented, local authorities and community groups
should consider applying slow zones.

My Department has
been funding this programme of works since 2015. Provision has also been made
for a 20 km/h speed limit. The 20 km/h speed limit should only be used in very
limited circumstances, set out in the updated traffic signs manual. It is not
intended to replace the 30 km/h speed limit as the norm in housing estates. In
addition, in 2013 my Department issued the design manual for urban roads and
streets. This provides for improved design to support traffic calming and safer
interaction between road users by encouraging lower speeds on new roads in
urban areas. Apart from making provision for variable speed limits, I have no
plans to review or to change the range of speed limits available to road
authorities.

It is welcome that 6,400 housing estates have implemented signage for
slow zones. I note the remarks the Minister made about 20 km/h speed limits but
I am not sure that it is valid that we should not have scope for 20 km/h or 25
km/h speed limits.

I obtained figures from the Courts Service recently and they show that,
in 2017, almost 26,500 speeding offences were prosecuted in the courts, of
which 6,634 resulted in convictions. Similarly, in 2018, almost 23,000 speeding
offences were prosecuted in the courts, of which 4,245 resulted in convictions.
So far this year, almost 10,000 speeding offences have been prosecuted, so it
is clear that speeding remains a serious problem.

Deputy Durkan probably remembers the debates we had in the Chamber with the former Deputy, Seamus Brennan, when he was Minister. Should we not go back to the 2004 Act, examined the range of the speed limits from the slow zones up to the 120 km/h zones and conducted a total review of them to give us a procedure to ensure we would have much safer roads?

The Deputy and I are probably on the same page on this matter. The 20
km/h limit is slow and is only meant to be used in special circumstances such
as on a street that is pedestrianised for most of the day but that allows
limited access to delivery vehicles at certain times or on a shared surface
street in an urban area where there are no separate footways. The Deputy can
understand that, although he will the first to point out that 30 km/h can be a
killer in certain circumstances as well. That justifies the use of the slow
zones.

The Deputy
mentioned the speed limit reviews. In recent years, the local authorities have
been reviewing speed limits on rural roads in accordance with the 2015 speed
limit guidelines. It is a major exercise and he will be aware of it. It should
improve consistency in the application of speed limits across the country,
which, in turn, should contribute to improved road safety. I have written to
local authorities to urge them to complete their speed limit reviews urgently
and my officials have been pursuing them since. I am pleased that as of April
this year, 23 local authorities had completed their reviews, five were
expecting completion in 2019 and only three were not clearly indicating
completion this year. There is a need for a constant revision and review of
speed limits of this sort to ensure consistency and to reduce speed limits in
places where they are too high.

Is it time for us
to move towards the Swedish vision zero approach where it is taken for granted
that, unfortunately, some drivers will make mistakes? That is particularly the
case at higher speeds and responsibility for the speed limits has to go back to
the national authorities and the car manufacturers. We have had a situation
where it has been three decades since we made our own cars and, therefore, we
are relying on manufacturers abroad, as far away as Japan and so on, to make
the vehicles. Is it time that we required them, as Volvo seems to be doing in
Sweden, to go down the road of having limiters installed in cars? They allow
for mistakes to be made at reasonable speeds. In other jurisdictions they have
special limits for adverse weather conditions, night driving and so on. Is it
not time for us to review the 2004 Act and examine the other slight amendments
we have made and conduct a fundamental review to eradicate the terrible
casualties we still experience?

The Deputy will be even more aware than I am that speed is one of the
great killers in the road safety firmament and it is something that still
causes a lot of deaths in Ireland. Despite the fact that our road safety
figures are somewhat better, speed remains a top killer and it is something we
must face up to. The fact that we are facing it, mostly on housing estates, and
we are reviewing the speed limits to try to introduce consistency acknowledges
that. Hopefully, that will keep the numbers of road deaths as low as possible.

I wish to tackle
the larger issue the Deputy raised, namely that we should consider some of the
approaches to the speed problem on the continent. I am open to any suggestions
which would work to save lives. I would not turn down any such suggestions. I
am in the process of putting forward a road traffic Bill, which tackles the
problem of speeding and addresses it with graduated penalties for speeding.
That will be aimed at tackling this problem but if the Deputy wishes to make
amendments to that Bill when it comes through the Houses, I will look on them
as benignly and as favourably as possible.